Today we’d like to introduce you to Roxy Vail.
Hi Roxy, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I got started getting into visual art and content creating in high school, back in the MySpace days, in my hometown in St Louis, Missouri. My twin sibling, London Spinelli would take my photos on a small digital camera and we’d have so much fun setting up our little photo shoots. London and I took each other’s photos for social media over the years, but it wasn’t until around 2012 or 2013 when I started cultivating a small following online for my art and fashion. London and I left Missouri to move to the East coast to turn my hobby into a lifestyle and take it more seriously and London wanted to be a content creator and Alternative fashion designer and we knew there are no opportunities for growth as an artist, let alone, as a Black Alternative Model or Fashion Designer in St Louis.
Once I moved out there, I later got contacted to travel to Pittsburgh PA to pose for a small Alternative/Punk pinup magazine. I shot about 6 different looks that weekend and then, BAM! There I was, in my first glossy-page magazine and I then, started to feel like a real artist from then on, while London and I were living in a cluttered storage space in an unfamiliar place where we knew no one, We lived off of my paid photoshoots while we lived there. That’s when I began earning my living from it.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I wouldn’t redo my early modeling days even if you paid me a million dollars. I’m aware that this is a family publication, so I will not be too graphic, but my baby-model days came with a lot of photographers and shoot coordinators doing awful things to me on set against my will if we shot in lingerie, the amount of explicit racism I’d face from vulgar comments at photoshoots, getting my ethnicity whitewashed in photos because they said “We like your likeness but it being paired with a Black body makes it look cheap” so they’d turn my skin white in photos, to people telling me that they will not hire me for group fashion shoots because adding Black people will turn it into a political thing and they’re not trying to – as they’d put it – “pander to woke people” as if my existence is a political statement just because I exist as a Black woman and apparently, Black women “don’t belong in fashion…unless”, as a photographer said to me, “she’s practically a White woman dipped in Chocolate milk- but the key is, being mixed with something – which you’re not” and I still remember those words he said to me – not just him, SO MANY different photographers would rip apart my ethnic bone structure, skin color, my hair texture and things, make me have a breakdown on set, then force me to do things to them, even though they spent the whole photoshoot, telling me how physically repulsive I am. I still get nightmares from my earlier days starting out and I wish it was talked about more, but I understand why so many models don’t speak up, especially Black models because we already have 10x less opportunities than our nonblack counterparts and so we endure getting paid less, never having a stylist or makeup artist on set while every white model does, dealing with showing up to our scheduled shoots and then being told “Now that everyone is here, having 3 Black girls is excessive, so we’re keeping the mixed girl, but one of you has to go, you two can decide among each other or come to the back area with me and “prove how much you want it” which we all know what that means. It affected my physical and mental health so badly that I was at a point, down to 85 lbs. I had to work at my craft and relocate quite a few times before finding a safe community.
It wasn’t until I went to a 10-month beauty school program out of state, in St. Cloud, MN where I started meeting other people – granted the photographers weren’t always the best but they made it possible for me to continue making art. It wasn’t until I met, my now, best friend and partner in crime, Dwella and she gave me hope in this messed up industry. She was the first model who took me seriously as an artist and didn’t see me as “just another Black girl in her way” but she truly saw me as a queen and goddess and just wanted me to have the modeling experience that I deserved and we were completely inseparable for my whole time in school. I completed my program and had to move back to the East coast where I lived with my, now, ex-boyfriend. Dwella and I would talk every single day on facetime for 4-6 hours a day. I opened up to her about everything and even about living with my toxic partner and when it got so bad that she feared for my life with him, she helped me escape back to Minnesota to start a life with her and we were gonna heal and make a name for ourselves as artists – so in June of 2018, I took a one-way flight to Minnesota to live with Dwella and I’ve been the “Romy” to her “Michelle” ever since. As soon as I got there, she hooked me up with my first shoot with a femme photographer named Hillary Olsen, who’s since, relocated, which was so huge, along with a full list of safe photographers who support and love models of all ethnicities and most importantly, photographers who keep their hands off and their pants up for the whole shoot. Dwella plays a huge role in where I am today and who I am today.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I’m an Alternative Model and I’m mostly known for my dark themes, Gothic-Grunge style and my very dramatic poses and eccentric outfits. But I think most people know me from the many shocking themes I do like photos of me doing gore, witchy themes, knife swallowing and having professionals pierce my body with hooks and then suspend myself in mid-air, hanging from my skin. I think one photo shoot that I still hear a lot about was one where I was covered in fake blood made of chocolate Hershey syrup and red food dye and held a real deer heart and bit into it.
Most people just know me by my signature “Red and Black” aesthetic in about 85% of my content.
If you had to, what characteristic of yours would you give the most credit to?
I think the fact that I laugh at my pain. It may not be the healthiest of coping mechanisms, but I’ve gotten through every ounce of my trauma through making jokes and learning to evolve and adapt. So many people have been through what I’ve been through and the nightmares alone have caused their breaking point but I’m thankful that I have been able to stick through it. If I’m being honest, having London and Dwella in my corner as my support system also plays a huge role because it was the fact that I had an outlet to talk to them, that kept it from festering inside of me when I’m at my lowest and for that, I’m so thankful but as for qualities in myself, I am very whimsical, creative and always looking at everything as inspiration.
Contact Info:
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: Instagram.com/itsroxyvail
- Other: Tiktok.com/itsroxyvail
Image Credits
Brad Sigal (@bradsigalphotos)
James Gross (@jamesgro2199)
Elissa Evenson (@skywoman.visuals)
Amber Griffin (@am.griffin.mn)
Andy Knettle (@aknettle)
Elissa Evenson (@skywoman.visuals)
